Gun shy

Gavin Inglis, Southend-on-Sea

12:01AM GMT 24 Feb 2003

Sir - Recent letters have reminded me of an uncomfortable experience in the late 1970s, when I was a young Customs officer carrying out a VAT visit in Wales and a trader suddenly reached behind a chair and produced a shotgun. The firearm wavered in my direction before the trader rushed to the door and blasted away at pigeons on adjacent telephone wires.

Having realised at the start of the visit that this "sole proprietor" had been one half of a partnership on which I had been instrumental in levying a five-figure fine some few years earlier, I made my excuses and left.